This weekend was our very first dog show in the Maritimes. It was a pretty fun time and people were very friendly - especially the Ridgeback exhibitors (that makes a nice change). It was 4 shows held in 2 days which made it long and tiring but easier on the pocketbook than 4 shows over 4 days.
I'll start with beautiful and brilliant Leeloo. She got Reserve Winners the very first time she went in the ring, she was a little suspicious about why the judge was touching her bum but she stood fairly still. Unexpectedly we won Best Puppy in Group because ... we were the ONLY hound puppy! So off to Best Puppy in Show and although she was still a little bewildered she handled the stress very well. She was definitely not sure why there was a white fluffy Samoyed following her all the time though!
The second show the judge exclaimed how pretty she was as we did our first go round and then awarded Miss Legs her very first 2 point win. I was so pleased with my little Bubby. Of course, we won BPIG again by default and again we headed into Best Puppy In Show. It had been a long day but Leeloo was such a good girl and the judge, when she was going to present the award, said everyone had very nice puppies "... but can I take the Ridgeback home?" I sort of stood a moment and thought "Wha ...?" And then realized she intended to give Leeloo Best Puppy in Show! The win was made more significant by the fact that this judge, Janet Buchanan, has bred Ridgebacks, Deerhounds and more recently Salukis (under the Auldstane prefix) so she knows her hounds. I honestly don't think any other judge, who was not familiar with hounds, would have given Leeloo a second glance(in fact that is what happened the balance of the weekend).
Not to be completely outshone by the little starlet ... Raimi won breed the first three shows, placed third in group at the third show but lost breed to a very nice specials bitch the last show. When I realized the judge was checking rears I knew we were done and let's face it - Raimi's rear assembly is not his fortune! He showed great for me the whole weekend though and I really intended it to be a practice to see how best we would work together - we have a few glitches to work out but in all I think he was a very good boy. People were telling me though how obvious it is that he just adores me ... sigh.
Leeloo, to complete the weekend, won absolutely nothing the next two shows! We started calling her Lee-loser. She didn't even win the puppy group as there was a little dachshund puppy entered in the Sunday shows. Ah well, it simply meant we could leave early on Sunday as we had a long drive and were really tired.
In all it was a pretty great weekend to start our stint in the Maritimes ... here they are after the first show and Leeloo is thinking about pulling that ribbon into the pen to eat. Raimi looks stricken, "Where's my ribbon?" He got his the next day so he's happy now ... his is yellow though. We'll see what other colors we can bring home in the future.
1 comment:
Congratulations! That's pretty exciting news for Invictus!
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